


On the Subject of Mage Rights

by Ms_Adequate



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games)
Genre: Abuse, Anders - Freeform, Anders Manifesto, Beating, Branding, Chantry, Circles - Freeform, Imprisonment, Mage Rights, Oppression, Pro-Mage, Rape, Solitary Confinement, Torture, Violence, anti-chantry, kidnap, manifesto
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-28
Updated: 2017-11-28
Packaged: 2019-02-07 19:16:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,736
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12847734
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ms_Adequate/pseuds/Ms_Adequate
Summary: I was always a bit irritated that I could never actually read Anders's manifesto, given how long he spends on it and how important it is to him. From a purely political perspective I would find it interesting, nevermind as someone who firmly agrees with him. Instead it is treated mostly as a joke, with pages found all over the place and his spelling made fun of.So I undertook to write a version of it myself. I do not believe he would shy away for one second from describing all of the things the templars do to mages and how awful the Circles are, and so neither did I. Please be advised that this does mean the piece does contain fairly extended and stark discussion of a lot of unpleasant topics, though I would not personally characterize it as explicit per se. Still, appropriate content warnings apply, as outlined in the tags.





	On the Subject of Mage Rights

**On the Subject of Mage Rights**

**By a Free Mage**

**Dragon 9:34-9:37**

 

**Manifesto of Free Mages**

 

Seven. Seven Tevinter Magisters is all it took for a millennium of oppression and worse to be inflicted upon the mages of the world. Seven Magisters Sidereal stepped into the Golden City of the Maker and, with each step, blackened and corrupted it. It is both justification for the oppression of mages and a cudgel to silence any who would question that oppression. Which mage who has asked for a simple boon of seeing the sun, of visiting a sick mother, of hoping merely to love another person openly, has not been accused of corruption, of apostasy, or that dread charge—Maleficar? Where is that Circle which has not branded mages with such vituperation, as prelude to the true brand of Tranquility?

In any one Circle reside more than seven templars who abuse their powers, who inflict cruelties and depredations upon adults and children alike. There have been more than seven nobles whose very names were fell curses to their people, more than seven criminal Chantry brothers and sisters, more than seven ordinary people who commit blasphemies, but in no other place do the actions of a mere seven people condemn a whole class for a thousand years and more.

The mages of Thedas have been held in brutal chains for many Ages, and punished for nothing more than the natural yearning of all people for freedom. Three things now are more true than ever:

 

1) Mages are an acknowledged force in this world, and thus we must regard ourselves as having the capability to use this for our own liberation.

2) It is past time that mages state plainly our views, our objectives, and our true natures, to combat the falsehoods spread by the Chantry and show the people of the world our sincere desire for nothing more than free and peaceful lives.

3) The very forces we decry make it impossible for mages to safely gather and freely discuss such matters. A more collaborative effort would be far preferable, and in time we must hope a new edition might be published that is the result of free mages discussing their fates without the fear of a templar’s sword at their throats.

 

**Magic and Law**

 

Magic is a gift from the Maker. So says the Chant of Light, yet it is the Chantry of sisters and brothers, chanters and clerics, that oppresses us. The Chantry laws are based on fear of an empire that crumbled a thousand years ago. If the Maker hates magic, why would he still gift it to us? The Chant further says Magic exists to serve man, and never to rule over him, but the only thing magic does is serve as pretext to rule over a class of people. Magic can benefit everyone. Magic can heal, it can cure the wounded and the lame, can drive out diseases, can bring comfort to the distressed and alleviation to the pained. To lock mages away in the Circles and prevent all such uses is to oppose that very Chant.

Think also of the situation outside the heartlands of the Southern Chantry’s control. Tevinter is a place of great flaws and much brutality, but magic is only one aspect of this, and the Orlesian ‘Grand Game’ is hardly less vicious in machinations. The Avvar and the Chasind tribes have shamans and augurs, and both groups of people endure, their fortunes certainly not dimmed by their magic. The Dalish too keep traditions of magic, and their mages hold positions of considerable authority and respect.

In any of these cases, if the use of magic without Chantry oversight was half so dangerous as is claimed, they would have been wiped out long ago. But the intrigues of Tevinter do not see Minrathous razed by demons, nor does the ancient lore of Dalish keepers mean their clans have fallen to assault from the Fade.

Yet the sins of the Chantry are vastly beyond the mere existence of Circles. If their sole crime was to kidnap mages but in all other matters, even involving those mages, they were fair and just, there could be room for incremental changes. There is no room for incrementalism, and this is by the design of the Chantry. The Circles are not places of learning, they are not places for mages to learn responsible use of magic, nor are they truly places that ensure the safety of the non-magical folk from magical misuse. It is, in fact, stress and fear and danger which are the greatest dangers to mages. It is those extreme negative emotions which can drive the desperate into the arms of demons. And no place on Thedas, save perhaps the darkest recesses of the Deep Roads, causes such hateful emotions to a mage as a Circle.

It must be made known across the world how cruel and merciless the templars are. The authority granted to them by the Chantry is bad enough, but they are always able, always willing, to go much further. Mages can be killed outright, and no templar will ever be questioned properly for this. Harrowed mages have been made Tranquil, against Chantry law, and no consequences ever come of this. Mages in the Grey Wardens are often harassed by templars who cannot abide even that limited freedom, and sometimes plots of kidnap or murder are made against those Mages. The Wardens, heroes who have saved the whole of the world many times, have enough to concern themselves with without the worry of templar interference, and so often relent out of necessity. But if even that most noble and heroic institution is not trusted by the ORder to handle the affairs of their own mages, how can any new ideas be debated or attempted?

We must discuss in more detail some of the many depravities the templars of the Chantry inflict upon mages. These are deeply unpleasant topics but only in the light of truth can we hope to have justice. And justice we must have, for these are not mere accidents, not anomalies, not the result of the occasional ill-intentioned templar who evades detection. These calumnies are the direct outcomes of the Circles, and in truth they are the purpose of the Circles too, however much the Chantry might insist they are for safety and scholarship. After so many Ages how can it be denied that the system works precisely as it is meant to work?

 

1) Beatings

 

Beatings of all kinds are commonplace. They are in the main unregulated, but do not mistake this for being unsanctioned. The ability of a templar to deliver any degree of physical violence to any mage, at any time, for any reason, is well understood in Circles to be one of their many unassailable rights. They will beat children and the elderly as ready as anyone else. To be awoken by being kicked with a steel boot in the stomach or head is something all Circle mages know the feeling of. The slightest flash of anger or defiance will be met with a mailed fist to the face. Imagine doing your work, privately and quietly, only to be struck with great force for an imagined slight, with no recourse whatsoever. This is what all mages trapped in Circles live with, every day.

Then there are the formally administered corporal punishments. Mages can be beaten and whipped for a wide variety of charges, none of which need be satisfactorily proven. Worse, templars will frequently administer these beatings and then ban the use of magic to relieve the injuries. They claim the resulting scars are needed to ‘remember’ the discipline, as though anyone could forget their helpless state in the Circles! No, this is merely an additional cruelty inflicted by those with power against those who lack it, for no reason but the twisted pleasure of exerting that power.

 

2) Harrowing

 

The ‘test’ called Harrowing is kept secret from both apprentice mages and the world at large. There is a very good reason for this, but it is not the reason the Chantry gives. They claim this ‘test’ cannot be prepared for because it will ruin its efficacy, and that it must be effective for reasons of safety. This is not so! We will reveal to the world that harrowing is a cruel and dangerous practice where an apprentice mage is thrown to the mercy of demons to see whether they can resist it or not. All mages must be prepared to resist demonic temptations, but no way is less effective than simply throwing the unprepared to the wolves, with the additional knowledge that templars stand over their body and can at any time decide the test has taken too long, or the worried twitches of a nightmare signal defeat, or deploy any other flimsy excuse, and thence drive their swords into the sleeping apprentice’s heart.

We free mages of Thedas hold that this practice must be ended immediately. It traumatizes those who pass, and trauma leaves mages more vulnerable. It deliberately terrifies those who take it, and terror leaves mages more vulnerable. The imposition of secrecy drives a wedge between apprentices and harrowed mages, weakening bonds of friendship and solidarity. It is nothing less than an effort to cull the number of mages in the world, and to cow those who do pass into submission. Those who elect not to take this test at the moment of its revelation (We are given no time to think on this heavy matter of course), or those who are merely deemed unlikely to succeed, are instead placed under that most dreaded sanction of tranquility, a unique evil we shall come to in due course. Those, however, are your choices - risk demonic possession leading to your death, risk death for taking too long for a templar’s liking, or accept the total removal of all that makes a person a person.

 

3) Kidnap

 

All of the sins of the Circle stem from their ultimate and unquestioned right to take anyone with magical ability and render them to the Circle of the templars’s choosing. In plainer terms, from their right to kidnap on a vast scale. No mage needs reminded of this trauma, but the layperson might benefit from meditating on this for awhile. Every day, young children discover they have a spark of magical talent, and unless they are very fortunate to have open-minded and protective parents, they will soon be reported to the Chantry authorities as a mage. Before long, this child (The typical age of rendition is six) will be confronted by a phalanx of armed, armored templars, who betray no hint of compassion for their new charges.

If they are lucky, such a child might permitted to take a single small item as a keepsake from home. Perhaps a pillow or small carved doll, as examples. That is the entirety of templar beneficence, though they will act as though this is the very indulgence of Andraste herself. More commonly, even the clothes they wear will be ripped from them as they are carted, in cuffs, away from all they know. The pernicious poisoning of men’s minds by Chantry propaganda about mages very often means their families will cast them out as tainted and sinful, leaving the child alone in the world. But even where the natural love one has for one’s children, siblings, etc. sees through the Chantry’s lies, it makes little difference. If your parents are especially wealthy and socially prominent, you may be afforded the very occasional and always censored exchange of letters. For all others, you will never see or hear from your family again. If mages are said to be dangerous, how much of that danger stems from the repeated traumas of being ripped from parents as a pre-adolescent, quickly introduced to the templars’ tender mercies, and sequestered in the cold Circles? With no hope of seeing that family again, or often, even seeing the sky.

 

4) Solitary Confinement

 

The Chantry’s law states that a mage who has passed their Harrowing cannot be made tranquil. This is not, in fact, a law that templars adhere to with great rigor, but it does at least serve as something of a check. In lieu of this sanction, for so-called ‘crimes’ that do not result in immediately killing the mage, the templars are deeply fond of the practice of solitary confinement.

In comparison the other punishments which are discussed here, this seems less severe. It does not inherently involve physical violence (Though few templars will resist the chance to beat a mage who is about to be locked away where nobody will see the bruises) or other abuse. But all the races of Thedas are social creatures, and humans and elves need the company of other thinking creatures to maintain their sanity. To be locked in a small, dark, dank room for such sins ranging from attempts to visit one’s family (With no regard given even for extenuating circumstances such as an imminent or recent bereavement), to any nebulous ‘disobedience’ as trivial as making a mess or removing a library book without permission, to the mere whims of a capricious Knight-Commander.

In truth it is one of the darkest and cruelest of all the punishments at the disposal of the Circles. In most situations a mage can at least take some comfort from the company of other mages. Although this is always circumspect out of necessity, nonetheless it can be a solace of considerable worth simply to know another has seen and recognized the injustice one has suffered. To be alone in a cell is to remove that, it is indeed to amputate a person from the social body that is necessary for a healthy mind and life. More, it inspires a mage to doubt the truth of their reality, to seek stimulation through means such as harming oneself with whatever is at hand, causes hallucinations, and can cause many more mundane health effects such as headaches and panic attacks.

To emphasize just how little a mage is worth, it is usual to throw them into this confinement wearing only their smallclothes. This is, supposedly, to ensure they cannot make use of sleeves or torn strips for escape or suicide attempts, but the result is that the mage is at the mercy of the climate. A freezing cell in a Fereldan winter, or a burning one in an Antivan summer, the mage will have no respite. Hushed discussions abound whether this is a deliberate additional punishment or merely the calculation that a mage’s robes are worth more than the mage who wears them, and there is no need to risk it being torn or soiled by the maddened.

In addition to the injustice in principle, the effects of solitary confinement could hardly be better tailored to serve as a means to weaken a mage’s mental strength against the influence of the Fade’s malign inhabitants. Desperate, unable to fully distinguish truth and imagination, and presented with any hope of comfort or companionship only when sleep takes them to the Fade, it is unlikely mages are ever more vulnerable. Justice demands the absolute and immediate abolition of such cruelties, but so does a pragmatic concern for safety.

 

5) Phylacteries

 

Within hours of arriving at a Circle, a young mage will undergo a minor ritual which will forever chain them to the power of the Chantry. A small drawing of blood is taken and placed in a vial, and this is then taken for safekeeping in a part of the Circle where no mage is permitted access. This is termed the phylactery, and its use is very simple. So long as it is available to the templars, a mage’s blood can be used to track them down wherever they might go. Even a mage who does escape their Circle need not use their magic nor confess their status to soon be found by cruel hunters. It is not uncommon for these escapees to be killed by their templar hunters even if they pose no danger and surrender immediately, and it is widely known that the only reason most so-called apostates do return is because they can serve more effectively as a symbol of the Chantry’s indomitable will. Were that lesson not imparted by a mage’s return and inevitable punishment, it is probable most or all escapees would be slain as soon as they are found.

Let us take a broader view, however, as well as that pertaining to the abuses suffered by individual mages. Recall that this means of tracking relies on the blood of a mage, and this blood is used in arcane rituals to point to their location and set the Order’s hounds upon them. Few things are as dangerous as blood magic, both because of its own inherent powers and because it is of great interest to demons, but it is the Templar Order who makes by far the most use of blood magic, with the Chantry’s knowledge and sanction! There are many hypocrisies in the Chantry’s treatment of mages, but this is certainly one of the most stunning in its flagrancy.

 

6) Rapes and other Abuses

 

For all the other sins of the Chantry in the treatment of mages, they still have defenders and justifications, however self-serving, however unconvincing. The abuses endured by mages of a sexual nature are unique in that they are as frowned upon by the Chantry and laypeople as the same sins being committed by anyone else. That they happen anyway, that they are in fact utterly endemic, says much about the state of the Circles; even where all people can agree something is a terrible sin that must never be allowed and must never go unpunished, the templars are able to act with near-impunity to inflict whatever outrages they wish.

Though this particular act may not be intended by the Chantry, the facts of the Circles nonetheless lead inexorably to them being committed. Mages have no power, whilst templars have very great power. A mage who makes an accusation of rape against a templar will immediately be censured for attempting to cause unrest, are accused of lying, and most importantly have no higher recourse. Even on the rare occasions when contact with the outside might be made, the general sentiments that prevail regarding mages ensure that a templar’s word will always be taken over a mage’s. Even that is an outlying case; far more likely is that the mage will suffer in silence, unable to resist for fear of beatings, whippings, imprisonment, or other ‘legal’ sanction. Templars, by the nature of the power they are accorded, can easily find mages at isolated times, or simply engineer such occasions. They have many threats they can make, and make good on, to secure obedience. Perhaps even more perversely, they can also make promises of reward or favorable treatment. Mages who pursue those promises can hardly be faulted, though sadly even that limited route to an improved situation rarely yields results, and more rarely still does it last long.

This great power imbalance manifests in more subtle, though no less perverse, ways as well. Even if we assume a templar acting in good faith who takes a fancy to one of their wards—how can said ward refuse them safely? They have nowhere to go to avoid the templar. They have nobody to make representations to should the templar dislike a rejection. Some templars, it is true, will take a rejection in an appropriate manner, but the mage cannot know beforehand whether they are in such a situation, or whether hot rage or cold calculation will inflict a revenge upon them.

Yet perhaps the most cruel of all is the consequence that stems from voluntary and sincere affections. To a Circle mage, few notions are as forbidden or as dangerous as love is. Romance is discouraged, though this cannot stop the natural impulses of the heart. Nonetheless, to love another mage is to give the templars a terrible and powerful weapon against you. It is trivial for the Circles to exchange mages and move them around, for a number of reasons both credible and spurious—but no mage has a means to appeal, and as this is not characterized as a punishment, there is no need for a templar to make even the weakest representation of just cause. So mages who earn the ire of a templar will very soon find themselves separated from those they love even if no other so-called ‘crime’ is suspected. The Chantry, it must be said, is little kinder to their templar enforcers in this case. Relationships between mages and templars are expressly forbidden, though this hardly prevents them. The mage’s punishments will be more severe, but the templar will certainly be out of favor for their indiscretions. Not even their own enforcers are accorded much safety in the face of the grinding machine that oppresses mages.

And then there are the products of such unions. Nothing is more hateful to the Chantry than the bonds of family, for nothing can restore the convictions of an oppressed person as effectively as concern for the wellbeing of a child. So where clandestine affairs result in a baby, that baby is taken from the parents within hours of birth, never to be seen again. The child is placed in an orphanage and raised as any foundling. Should they themselves manifest as a mage, every effort will be made to ensure they are never in the same Circle as those which hold either parent. These are crimes upon crimes, of the utmost cruelty, all designed to ensure mages remain unable to ever forget or to ever question their masters.

It is difficult to conceive of Circles which could remain remotely similar to today’s but which succeed in abolishing these hideous crimes. The difference in power, in authority, in simple respect, in recourse, in the Chantry’s backing, is so vast that no simple reforms could make a meaningful difference.

 

7) Murder

 

One of the two final answers to the mage ‘problem’ which the Chantry faces is to simply kill those who offend. The Chantry does not officially sanction execution as a punishment for a mage purely as a mage, and this is always used as an argument to demonstrate their supposed even-handedness and probity. Other crimes, however, can still be punished by execution, and the formality of a trial will do nothing to ensure the outcome is just. It is effortless for a templar to claim that execution should not be inflicted for magical crimes but rather ordinary crimes which happened to use magic. They are disinterested in the hypocrisy here, of recognizing mages can simply be people with specific abilities, when at all other times they insist we are unique for our gift of magic.

Those very few mages who do manage to escape an official execution are soon likely to find themselves wishing they had not, for the templars do not take kindly to having their power thwarted.

Nonetheless the bloody work of execution can arouse mages to anger, and so it is sparingly used. It is in the less official realm where the real work is done. The legal avenues serve more as a cover to the world at large whilst reminding mages of their place as powerless chattel. A templar who wishes to see a mage dead will find no difficult engineering that situation, for it requires only the cry of “Maleficar!” or “Demon!” and all methods are permitted. And it is no challenge for a templar to ensure a mage is all alone, and so do their deeds in private and later be able to claim with impunity the grave dangers which the mage posed. The supposed dangers posed by mages mean that the benefit of the doubt is always given to the templar, who after all do such a ‘difficult’ and ‘dangerous’ job. Even on the occasions where the templar must confess to killing an innocent mage, it is always underscored with the pretext of the constant dangers templars face and the stresses they are supposedly under. What of the dangers mages face from our jailers? What of the stresses inflicted upon us, every day, by the Chantry? Yet again, we see an example of how the entire structure of Circles is ordered to oppress mages while empowering their oppressors.

 

8) Tranquility

 

For all the other abuses of the Circles and the templar jailers of innocent mages, for all the ultimate and irrevocable authority of the so-called Right of Annulment, it is the Rite of Tranquility which is the most singularly cruel, most ardently feared, most despised tool used to control the unfortunate prisoners of the Chantry. The ritual is a relatively simple one, administered with ease to any mage who can be restrained to suffer it. The presence of the brand of lyrium upon the forehead of the victim appears to be a necessary component, but that is no justification of so evil a practice, and serves well to enhance the terror of the ritual. Imagine seeing daily, all around you, people who were once friends, lovers, or even rivals, stripped utterly of all which made them people. They recognize you, but feel no emotions. No hint of their former affections or passions, their desires, their fears, remain. Only a flat affect and disconnected obedience to the very templars who inflicted this upon them. The reminder is constant, and it is the most utter cruelty ever devised by mortals.

The Right of Tranquility is unjust in the extreme, and the Chantry has the sheer temerity to claim it is a mercy! That it is the kind alternative to simple execution! There is no kindness to be found in this atrocity. It is an infliction of cruelty to both victims and those who observe it, it is a means to keep silent a onetime mage on any and all crimes they may have suffered, and it provides a compliant slave for any and all further uses the templars may desire. If the tranquil is lucky, this will merely be the drudge labor which even other mages cannot easily be compelled to perform. Very few tranquil are lucky.

Contrary to Chantry propaganda, there have been rare occasions of very temporary reversals of tranquility. In the few minutes in which the mage is returned to their true selves, they are universal in their horror at what has been done to them, and their terror at being returned to it. They all, without exception, beg to be killed rather than allowing that state to reassert itself over them, as it will do without fail. We must recognize this as evidence of the evil of the ritual, even as we search in the hopes that a permanent reversal might be achievable. When mages are free we must commit ourselves with great dedication to researching this possibility.

 

9) The ‘Right’ of Annulment

 

The Chantry enjoys pretending that their self-asserted ‘Right’ to murder an entire Circle’s mage population is a final act of desperation, when demonic corruption is so thorough that allowing anyone to escape is an intolerable danger. From the newest apprentice, even a child only arrived that morning, to the most respected and proven archmage or First Enchanter, harrowed and not, tranquil and not, human and elf, man and woman—all are put to the sword. All final pretenses of restraint and even-handedness, as puny as they are, are abolished and the work of a massacre begins.

This is the greatest crime the Chantry can commit against mages, and they do it regularly. Records are inevitably very poor, as they work extremely hard to cover up evidence of something that even the least interested layperson would have cause to question, but the work of the free mages has proven at least a dozen occasions on which this so-called Right has been invoked, and at least four more which are very close to certain, as well as the most recent effort at Kinloch Hold in 9:30 Dragon, an attempt which thank the Maker was averted through the strenuous efforts of the Hero of Fereldan, herself a former inhabitant of that Circle.

This power was first arrogated by the Chantry in 2:83 Glory, and so has been with us for some six and a half centuries. In that time, as stated, it has been carried out sixteen or more times. Every forty years, on average, the entire population of a Circle has been wiped out. There have been occasions where demonic influence has been present, as though that justifies killing the innocent with the guilty. Most shockingly, however, there are cases such as the Antivan Circle in 3:09 Towers. Just thirty years after the ‘Right’ was first granted to the templars, it was used in the total absence of any danger stemming from mages. Instead, the danger came from the Knight-Commander of that Circle, who invoked his authority in order to cover up the many murders committed by his second-in-command, a Knight-Captain Nicholas, who later abandoned the Order and set out on a personal crusade against mages. When finally his crimes became so great they could not be ignored, he was arrested and confessed to the murder of over one hundred mages. It has taken years of careful work by mages both free and in Circles to uncover even these limited details, and only the Maker knows what else might remain to be discovered.

This is not the exception. It is the rule. At its least evil, Annulment is the act of tremendous cowards who no longer dare carry out the very task they are recruited, trained, and drilled for, for many years. They say to the Fade with it, and simply kill all. At least as often, it is the design of a hater of mages who seeks to exert the final malign influence they are able to, or it is used in order to cover up the numberless crimes inflicted on mages in every Circle. If this so-called Right of Annulment can be so fantastically abused a mere thirty years after first being granted, and with consequences only for one of the perpetrators, who can sincerely suggest it is a necessary tool? If the ‘Right’ is so important and the Chantry is so just that it deserves such a right, why does it hide its efforts in the shadows and in the margins? If it is so noble, why not publish all instances when it is implemented, so that the world can see the brave work of the templars who slaughter the children cowering in their beds?

And yet again, as with so many crimes against mages, the greatest certainty of these efforts is to drive mages into the arms of the very demons they are supposedly already in league with. Why not? There is no escape from Annulment. No good standing will keep you safe; no years of obedience will stay the Order’s fury; no appeals for clemency are heard; no surrenders are accepted. Mages can choose only how they die, or to pay the terrible prices demanded by demons in a desperate effort to do nothing more sinful than continuing to live. But as these and so many other outrages against mages demonstrate, there is no greater sin in the eyes of the Chantry than to have been gifted the use of magic by our Maker.

The cumulative effect of these punishments is to create places of suffering and hopelessness. It is a terrible and tragic fact that, for all the direct killings by templars, the most common cause of deaths for mages in Circles is by taking their own lives. Suicide kills more mages than templar blades, more than old age, certainly more than demons or magical accidents, or anything else. Methods vary, but to ensure success, mages often use fire magic to immolate themselves, as this makes it very difficult to approach and interrupt them. Some notes left behind have also suggested this method deliberately invokes the death of Andraste, in the vain hope that our jailers will see the desperation and the piety combined, and be moved to mercy.

 

**Magic and the Maker**

 

The Maker’s children who have been gifted with magic must never be punished for that fact alone. Foul and corrupt are they who have taken His gift and turned it against His children—and all mages are His children, their own magic turned against them by templars. They speak of the dangers of mages, but what of the dangers posed by swordsmen and by archers and by the whims of nature? All those dangers can be made safer by the use of magic. Is it not a danger to be run through with a knight’s blade in time of war? Is it not a danger to be pierced by a bandit’s arrows? Is it not a danger when a flood or pestilence takes a harvest? Mages could easily help in such cases, healing wounds, turning arrows out of their flight, driving out pests, controlling waters, restoring soils. They say then that a knight can put down his sword, but so too can a mage refrain from using magic when it is unsafe. Most of the time the ordinary mage’s magic is no more obtrusive than the ordinary knight’s blade safe in a scabbard hanging from the waist.

Andraste suffered at the hands of magisters. Thus, she feared the influence of magic. But if the Maker blamed magic for the magisters’ actions in the Black City, why would He still gift us with it? The oppression of mages stems from the fears of men, not the will of the Maker. The world must realize that there are other choices between a cruel magocracy and the cruel oppression of mages.

One great secret of the Chantry and its Templar Order is that templars are in fact subject to great controls themselves. There are templars who join with sincere intentions, and many try to hold onto those intentions for a long time, but there is a fact which makes it incredibly difficult to do so. Namely, it is the fact that becoming a templar and employing the powers—the magical powers—they believe necessary to subdue mages requires they intake a considerable amount of lyrium on a regular basis. In a short time this leads to lyruium addiction. The suffering of withdrawal is a powerful salutary lesson to any templars who might think of acting on their sympathies towards mages and withholding lyrium is used without hesitation to bring a templar back into line. As with the blood magic of phylacteries, the Chantry’s hypocrisy is on full display, and they are quite ready to use magic for their ends and find excuses to claim it is not so. The templars are in their own way victims, and although we must not forsake the pursuit of our goals from such recognition, it does serve to amply demonstrate that the Chantry corrupts all that it touches.

The Chantry has long lost its way, and mages are far from the only ones to suffer at the hands of this corrupt and blasphemous institution. They seek to suppress the knowledge, but remember that Andraste was a promise of hope to elves as much as men, and one of her most loyal followers was Shartan, an elf. The Canticles regarding his role were long since struck from the Chant of Light, and now he is mentioned only in passing elsewhere. The Chantry would not stop until the elves were reduced to nomadism or the mean state of the alienages, and it has treated mages with similar fervent hatred. The Chant itself declaims the virtues of love and kindness, but these virtues have long been lost to the Chantry.

This is not to say no worshiper does good. In fact many do. But they are the innocent believers running around the hem of the institution’s skirt, whilst the edifice itself is a black beacon of cruelty and oppression. That an ordinary sister may distribute alms is to her credit, but she still belongs to a foul and corrupt body whose higher authorities use their vast wealth and power to augment their own status. When thousands fled Ferelden during the late Blight, was it the Chantry who opened their doors to the needy? Did refugees find shelter in those halls? Were the authorities of the Free Marcher cities convinced to allow refugees in by the moral arguments of the Chantry or the promise the Chantry would see to their bellies and diseases?

No! The hungry were fed by the help of the generous poor or worthy philanthropists of the cities they arrived at, paid for by donations made by those who already paid their tithes but saw no improvement. The diseases and wounds of the refugees were healed by apostate mages and by herbalists of few means nonetheless moved to kindness. Shelter was found in the homes of distant relations, in abandoned warehouses, in shacks, in sewers, or wherever else might serve to keep the wind and rain away for a night.

So we see that the people who are faithful to the Maker must not fear the steps which must be taken. All hope of peaceful change has been abolished by the power-hungry tyrants of the Chantry. Mages, especially, have no recourse to make changes. All thought of change is claimed to be heresy, the influence of demons, and is suppressed through any means deemed needed. Does the Maker smile, to see His children so abused? Does Andraste look on with approval as little children are ripped forever from their parents? Does anyone who sincerely believes in the Maker benefit from any part of this horror, or do benefits accrue only to those brutal people who sit high in the Chantry’s hierarchy? The faithful must demand change for their own sakes if not for the sakes of mages and elves and all others under the Chantry’s boot! Remember always the words of the Chant itself;

 

All men are the Work of our Maker’s Hands,

From the lowest slaves

To the highest kings.

Those who bring harm

Without provocation to the least of His children

Are hated and accursed by the Maker.

 

What provocation have mages done to justify their treatment at the hands of the Templar Order? Only to have been born with magic, which the Chant explicitly tells us, without room for doubt or misinterpretation, is a gift from our Maker!

It is a great irony that, excepting the Qunari, who treat their mages with even greater savagery than the Chantry, mages outside the Chantry’s grasp are the ones who are safest and happiest. The shamans of the Avvar are given respect and honors. The mages of the Dalish hold positions of leadership, providing both practical and spiritual guidance, and training their young mages to safely use their gifts. In Rivain, a land where the Chantry has always been treated with some dismissal and has authority only in the capital, mages are seers and hedge wizards who are respected, who are permitted to see their families and who can earn positions of authority and respect. In places such as this, magic is seen as the tool it is, able to improve lives and protect the weak. Mages do not rule them with brutality, slaves are not sacrificed for their blood, abominations do not pillage the streets or burn the aravels. Mages can live safely in a society, and this is not theory nor starry-eyed dreaming, it is a statement for which the proof is all around us.

 

**Demands of the Mages of Thedas**

“All Mages, Together in Freedom!”

 

Even now, at this late stage, and absent evidence of the bona fides of the Chantry, we free mages sincerely seek a peaceful resolution to the crisis of mage mistreatment. There is much which must be done, and so we mages of Thedas, who love freedom, make known the demands which must be met if we are to be satisfied that justice has been restored.

 

1) Mages deserve to be free. It is the natural right for every man and woman born in Thedas to be free.

 

2) Mages should be free to love whom they will and determine their own fate without interference from the Chantry.

 

3) Mages shall have the freedom to associate with each other and with anyone else as they see fit.

 

4) Mages must be treated as any other citizen or subject of the countries of Thedas. We must be held to the same standards, to the same laws, and given the same rewards or punishments for our deeds. Mages shall have the same legal protections, the right to seek redress of grievances, and for trials to be conducted in fair and unbiased ways.

 

5) Every mage must have the same opportunities for conducting business and engaging in political matters as any other citizen or subject of a given nation. This includes the use of magic as a service in exchange for remuneration.

 

6) Mages must have the right to wield magic without the fear of abuse at the hands of templars.

 

7) Mages demand that we be more than merely tolerated, and are brought fully into civic, social, and religious life.

 

8) The Chantry must immediately cease, and utterly and irrevocably renounce and repudiate, the many extraordinary punishments they inflict upon mages. Chief among these are the Right of Annulment and the Rite of Tranquility.

 

9) All mage phylacteries shall be immediately destroyed.

 

10) The Templar Order must immediately release all mages from all Circles, and must themselves disband without bringing harm to mages or their property, or doing anything which might prejudice, disrupt, damage, make impossible, or otherwise inhibit later investigations into their conduct.

 

11) There must be a full publication of all instances where the Right of Annulment has been carried out. Compensation must be paid to relatives, heirs, or other willed beneficiaries where they can be found, including any mage’s effects which remain intact.

 

12) Mages shall have the right to bring charges against individual members of the Templar Order, the templars of a particular Circle, and the Templar Order and Chantry in their own rights, for any and all abuses suffered at their hands. These cases shall be judged fairly by secular authorities and punishments shall be as they would in any other circumstances.

 

13) Free mages shall be permitted to form groups, associations, guilds, &c. for the cause of all mages. They shall be entitled to handle affairs relating to the above cases, to discuss the formulation of a new means of education for mages without templar oversight, and shall be the groups to whom mages that cause harm to others are remanded whilst awaiting trial. Mages shall be free to join and leave such groups without undue difficulties or hardships, and these groups shall enjoy the same privileges and protections as an equivalent guild of craftsmen might.

 

14) Where a Circle is dissolved, where compensation cannot be paid to a victim, or where the effects of a mage cannot be granted to a living beneficiary, aforesaid groups shall be endowed with all relevant proceeds, payments, effects, buildings, lands, &c., which they shall use to advance the cause of mages, establish places of learning, and provide care for mages who have nowhere else to go, as well as being a haven for Tranquil.

 

15) Resources shall be given by the Chantry to aforesaid mage groups specifically for the care of Tranquil mages and towards the efforts to reverse, undo, or otherwise cure that state. Tranquil mages should be employed only by other mages or in self-employment, in order to prevent their abuses at the hands of others, and must be given wages or payment in kind as anyone else doing those same jobs would. This status can be changed only on the authority of a mage’s guild, and only on a per-person basis.

 

16) Where mages are suspected of wrongdoing, or magical or demonic influences are clearly at work, the mage organizations outlined should, where feasible, be the authority used to resolve the situation. This will protect all, by ensuring appropriate specialists are employed against such dangers, and by ensuring those suspected of such crimes are treated appropriately by people who are even-handed, rather than the prejudiced hatreds of the existing Templar Order.

 

17) Templars may be employed by mage groups in order to assist in such efforts, but shall be under the command of said groups. Training of new candidates in the magical methods of the templars shall be conducted only under the auspices of mage’s organizations, and templars shall be properly cautioned on the lyrium addiction they risk. This addiction shall not be used against them for political purposes, or for the infliction of punishment, and they shall be ensured of an adequate supply to maintain their health including into retirement.

 

If these demands seem inflexible or excessive, if you are thinking perhaps they are reasonable in principle but this is too much at once, or if you think there is room for discussion on certain points, reflect on who is responsible for our situation! With mages allowed to exist only in Circles, with debate stifled by punishments, thought suppressed by the Rite of Tranquility, and a constant deliberate effort to ensure mages feel mutually mistrustful and disconnected from each other, there is no way to advance the cause of mages through any other means. All possibility of reformation or negotiated improvements has been destroyed by their hunger for power and hatred of mages. Even so, we free mages are lovers of peace, and we offer this final chance for the Chantry to change course. We beg all people of good faith to press the Chantry and all its appendages to resolve this grave crisis justly. Because if the Chantry does not respond to these demands there must be a revolution! They have made it impossible for change to come in increments! If at this late hour they do not radically change themselves, then they will face the reality that the Chantry was built by men, and it can be brought down by them.

 

Justice or corruption.

Liberty or imprisonment.

Equality or oppression.

 

**The war is coming—you must choose a side!**


End file.
